


Five times Mycroft failed Sherlock

by WordOfAll



Series: Mycroft, darkness and love [1]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Dysfunctional Family, F/M, Family Drama, Kid Mycroft, Kid Sherlock, M/M, Mycroft-centric
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-07
Updated: 2013-03-11
Packaged: 2017-12-04 13:44:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 9
Words: 21,173
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/711396
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WordOfAll/pseuds/WordOfAll
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Follows Mycroft Holmes from the age of seven up to the time of the series. Dark and sad.</p><p>Basically just Mycroft desperately trying to be a decent human being and a good brother - and often failing miserably.</p><p>First few chapters are focused mainly at the Holmes brothers´relationship, Lestrade will emerse in the Failure No3.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. It started with a failure

The first time Mycroft read Spinoza, he knew that this was to be his way. All the other philosophers were either too idealistic or too elaborate in their view of the world; and surely if you make an abstract of an abstract idea in the end you get a generalisation too simple to be of use.

But Spinoza was hard and layered. And most importantly, he seemed to share the same view of emotions as his father, bearing in mind that father never cared enough to enlighten his seven years old son why exactly should one wary of caring, whereas Spinoza offered a because clear enough.

Really, Mycroft was angry with himself that he didn´t read the books sooner, and let father´s constant accusations of being a freak and mother´s crying and fear get the better of him. But not now.

So, when mother told him through tears that he was going to have a little sibling, even though he knew she neither wanted another child nor was her health good enough for that and that this was most likely done to keep father´s fists of him, he shrugged the information away and returned to his book.

It was not Mycroft´s fault, really, that his mother had too weak a character to leave her husband and that she let herself be treated this badly. The seven year old even suspected that, in her heart of hearts, she enjoyed being treated badly in some sort of a crooked punishment for her sins (like her inability to behave properly in society).

It was also not Mycroft´s fault that she died. Because, surely, the one at fault is just now waving his hands in a cot and crying. How dare he? How is it possible that this little worm not only took his mother´s life but has enough guts to demand attention in the middle of the night?

Were father at home, he would have certainly stopped this pathetic wailing immediately, but Siger Holmes was at war and Mycroft hoped that whoever tried to claim the Faulklands would have aim good enough to take down his father´s plane.

As for aunt Amelie, she was drunk as a lord (he inwardly giggled) in the kitchen. For all her faults, and despite her custom to imbibe too much griotte in the evenings, Mycroft quite liked her, in the sort of way we like pets or fools, even though they will never reach your intellect.

But the house was empty apart from her, snoring on the kitchen table, tear streaked face disposing mucus on the cloth, and Mycroft and this little sorry excuse of a human being.

„Shut up." He tried, shuddering a little at the resemblance of his and father´s tone. „Shut up. I want to sleep. You did get your food. You have nothing in your nappie" (he checked). „ The room is reasonably warm. Shut up."

But the little creten continued to cry and really, Mycroft was just desperate for an hour or so of a nap and this bastard was taking it from him. „How dare you? You little... It is your fault, anyway, that you don´t have anyone to irritate. Do you even understand? You killed my mother."

Sherlock, as the baby was named after a family hero, who extended the Holmes´wealth to its current state, would not be mollified.

And suddenly, just as the shadows creep in the corners of a room of this damned house and then overthrow you because the moon is covered by a cloud, a thought tiptoed to Mycroft´s conscience.

This little worm was the source of all his current problems. Because were not for a baby, aunt Amalie would have gladly taken her „chubby little gentleman" with her to Bretagne and father would have let him go all too easily.

But aunt Amelie was fifty five and ill. In other words, there was no way she would have been able to take care of an infant Sherlock´s age. And the semblance of duty and good family name Siger Holmes kept stopped him from giving Sherlock away. Which ment crying babies in the mansion. Which ment sleepless Mycroft and angry father. Which ment sleepless and beaten Mycroft. Easy.

But what if there was no infant? What if the baby died? It would have been easy, really. An accident occuring during the night, while Mycroft and aunt Amelie slept and father was away on duty for Queen and country, at least for the authorities.

And just so, as soon as the idea planted itself in his brain, Mycroft took his little brother under the arms and padded from the carpet to the floorboards. Easy, really. Mycroft read somwhere, that over fifty percent of mysterious baby deaths is caused by a head injury. The bones are still soft. He would have to do some research on the matter later, but right now, he posessed all the intel he needed.

It would be like an execution. He killed Mycroft´s mother, now is time to pay. An eye for an eye and so forth.

Mycroft doesn´t remember how long he stood there, with a crying baby in his outstretched arms, getting ready to just let go. But at the precise moment he would have done it and allowed the bundle to slip through his fingers, Sherlock stopped crying and his previously forced shut eyes opened.

Those wide, beautiful light grey eyes. Calm and gentle. Trusting. This little smelly, noisy and dull bundle posessed his mother´s eyes and radiated through them just one thought: I trust you, Mycroft. I love you. You will not let go.

And he didn´t. He took the baby and hugged it tight towards his chest, a tight knot in his stomach, and then seated himself on the floor in the corner, where he hoped the shadow would cover his face.

„I am sorry. I am so, so sorry... I... Sherlock. Little brother. You are my little brother and I..." and right then he started to cry and tears welled up in his eyes and fell freely across his cheeks onto Sherlock´s face and the baby squeaked in surprise but then smiled.

„I am sorry. It wasn´t your fault. How could it be? You can´t even speak." Little hand grazed its fingers on Mycroft´s sleepshirt. „Oh my God, you are ten days old and I already failed you. Oh, God. Please. Please forgive me. I will protect you, Sherlock. From this day on I promise you that I will protect you, little brother. Even if it meant protecting you from myself."

And with his thoughts alternating between ´I have failed you´ and ´I will protect you´, Mycroft fell asleep in the corner. And after a few minutes listening to his heartbeat slowing, so did Sherlock.


	2. Angels don´t exist

In the end, neither Mycroft nor Sherlock spent any time with aunt Amelie in Bretagne, because the elderly aunt died of heart-attack, which, in Mycroft´s opinion, was certainly caused by her exuberant consummation of liquor, some six months after Violet Holmes´ death.

She named Mycroft her sole heir, and to father´s rage, she named her lawyer the keeper of the money until Mycroft came to age, which certainly raised the esteem the elder Holmes boy held her in.

Siger Holmes did not die on the Falklands and Mycroft wasn´t sure whether it was luck or a curse – now with aunt Amelie dead there was no one to look after the boys in his stead and even eight years old Mycroft realised that neither he, nor his little brother were capable of dealing with institutionalised care.

And then Victoria came. To this day Mycroft wonders exactly how did his brute of a father managed to not only attract this woman, but also not screw up a relationship which, as Mycroft suspected, started even before mother died.

He wanted to be angry at her, really, that she agreed to see a married man with the knowledge that there was an ill mother and a child. But since his mother was dead and nothing could have lowered the opinion he had about his father more, he overcome the want to sabotage their wedding and tried to tolerate her, especially as she was to be his only potential ally in Sherlock's protection.

And she did care about Sherlock. Far more than Mycroft would have thought. By the age of five, Sherlock was capable of writing, reading and calculus well advanced for a ten year old (which was Mycroft´s doing, of course), and playing violin so hauntingly that Mycroft often wondered if the child was letting his emotions loose this way in a place where emotions were taboo. He was a little jealous too, when he was watching Victoria, who used to be an orchestra violinist before getting trapped in the Holmes Manor, teaching his little brother and connecting him in some ways with a safe world of feelings. And he wished that this one thing helped his little brother to not end screwed up as Mycroft was.

It was no surprise, then, that the very evening Sherlock started to attend school he asked Mycroft unsurely: "Mycroft? Would you mind...? Could I call Victoria ´mummy´?" And when his older brother pierced him with a thoughtful gaze, the curly-haired boy elaborated: "All the other children have mummy and daddy. Even Sammy, whose dad died, has mummy. Only I have Father and Victoria and it´s weird."

"She is not your mother, you know that, right?" said Mycroft non-threateningly. He realised that Shelock is weird enough on himself, he did not need to add a strange family dynamic to the lot."Yes, of course I do. It is very unlikely that I would have light eyes when she has brown and all her relatives had brown. You told me that genetics works that way." Mycroft wasn't completely sure if his brother understood the whole concept of genetics or if he remembered only this one isolated example. He did not care.

"Why don't you ask Victoria?" suggested Mycroft and tried to return to his book only to be interrupted by a shuffle of a pair of uncertain legs. "And you would be ok with that?"

"I think so. I will call her Victoria, because I remember our mother, but you did never really see her except for photographs. And besides, being a parent is probably about something else than being blood-related, don't you think? I would say that parenting is more about responsibility and tending to children's needs. I think Victoria earned the title."

Bright grey eyes looked up mischievously. "Well, if this is the definition, I think you are my mummy, then." But by the end of the day, Sherlock was calling his step-mother mummy and Mycroft did not miss the proud lift-up of her head every time he used the name. He continued to call Siger Holmes father, though, and Mycroft knew that since Sherlock apparently accepted his little theory it meant the youngest Holmes shared his brother´s contempt for the man. Whether it was a good or a bad thing was a mystery.

But, and for that Mycroft was certainly thankful to whatever deity took care of the brothers, Siger Holmes did no longer beat his elder son and Sherlock never knew this side of the cold, uncaring man. At first Mycroft thought that the war changed his father, that somehow it brought up the best of Siger and forced him to realise that family is all we have in the end, when all our plans are lost and all our beliefs shattered.

But not long after the wedding his father came home drunk and angry and violent and baby Sherlock was crying and Mycroft couldn't calm him down and was sure that Siger would come up. He even started to localise all the possible hide-outs for a baby Sherlock´s height, because he knew that for all his aggression his father wasn´t very well coordinated when drunk and would probably turn his attention to Mycroft rather than crawl under a sofa to hurt an infant.

But Siger Holmes did not come up that night and did not come up any other, not even the night he lost his too precious job in the government because of too badly covered corruption. So he made sure his brother was sleeping soundly in one of the guest rooms where no one would look for him and slowly and incredibly quietly made his way down the stairs and through the hall to find out what is going on and how is it possible his father broke his habit.

Looking back, it is quite easy to guess the cause of the change in his father´s behaviour, since only one change happened in the Holmes household – Victoria – but Mycroft still did not fully believe it would be permanent and frankly, no one should blame an eight-year old for not fully understanding human nature.

His father and Victoria were shagging. In the kitchen. Rather messily, if one were to ask Mycroft´s opinion, and he couldn´t help mild disgust turning his stomach, considering that both participants were dirty and hairy and sweaty and in their behaviour strangely resembling desperate dogs.

Mycroft quickly made himself sparse and returned to the hall, where a left jumper belonging to Victoria and an overcoat haphazardly thrown over a chair (father never forgot to hang his coat – not even when he was going to hurt Mycroft, so he had to be in some kind of hurry) and the clip-thing Victoria used to tame her long black hair supported Mycroft´s theory that seeing the state Siger Holmes returned home in, Victoria seduced him rather easily and proceeded in his company to the kitchen to have sex.

But there is only so much one can deduce. Why did she do that? Does she even know what would happen if she hid herself in her room like mother did? Could she really be enjoying the things they were doing? Or is this some kind of noble mission he heard some women have misconstrued, does she hope to change Siger into a good man by her care and love? It might have been either one or all of them, but little Mycroft made sure Victoria was taking her pills, because pregnancy was out of the question now that the cunning boy found out the secret how to keep his father under control was to keep him sexually satisfied. And thankfully Victoria never expressed a wish to have a child, so the birth control Mycroft was keeping her under was not even that immoral.

By the time Mycroft was fourteen and Sherlock seven, everything somehow at least resembled normality, well, normality by the standards of the Holmes. Sherlock was incredibly bright student and quickly found amongst the many teachers he was pestered with the most intelligent and most tolerant. It was Mrs Wrbowski who introduced him to chemistry, so the younger Holmes alternated between heavenly sounds of violin virtuoso and window shattering bangs of experiments gone wrong.

As far as Mycroft knew, as he lived in the dormitory now, Victoria and his father still lived in the Manor, father still imbibed too much alcohol and Victoria still kept him on liege by sexual favours. She kept her beauty, but sometimes she had a very haunted look in her eyes and Mycroft suspected that she was nearing the end of her rope.

But before he was able to come up with some sort of a cunning plan which would insure both his and his brother´s safety, fortune struck again and Siger Holmes died, at the age of 48, after losing consciousness on the road and getting run over by a car on his way home from the club.

The funeral was a quick affair, some work colleagues ( and Mycroft was sure some of them attended to make sure his father was dead rather than shed tears, he didn´t mind), two or three women, probably former mistresses from years ago (Oh yeah, father. Good for you. Why would you need to be faithful to our mother, when she was a daughter of an artist without an idea how to act properly amongst posh idiots and after falling ill wasn´t even able to take care of your libido? The only reason I would not spit on your grave is because I at least, unlike you, have some decency) and the three remaining Holmes.

Sherlock, probably not feeling much of anything, Mycroft, silently hoping that perhaps with this man dead he could finally free himself of the fear of vulnerability, although he had no idea how to do it. And Victoria, who after a heart-wrenching eulogy continued to cry honest tears during the whole proceedings. Frankly, she put Mycroft to shame. Was it possible that he missed something of his father, some facet which would justify such emotional outburst?

The whole day felt wrong. After returning to the Manor, Sherlock raided the library looking for medical books and then wandered to the fields. Mycroft suspected that he was in search for some animals to kill them and simulate the decomposition of his father´s body. Perhaps he should have been outraged, but frogs died daily for far worse reasons than one boy´s curiosity.

He poured himself a glass of water, ignoring the decanter with brandy – not that he didn´t drink, but he swore to himself to never consume alcohol while stressed or confused or angry. When he looked into a mirror, he looked enough of his father without really becoming him. He hated it, the slightly wavy brownish hair, the freckly skin and plump constitution, all painful remainders how much of his father he really was.

Well, at least he won´t have mistresses, he chuckled inwardly. He figured it out about a year ago, that although there were some exceptions of girls he found desirable, the vast majority of people he found attractive were man. So, even if he found a woman clever and beautiful enough to marry, and felt the need for sexual favours outside the house, he wouldn´t have mistresses. Is the male equivalent ´rent-boy´? he wondered.

"Mycroft? Do you want tea?" asked a muffled voice from the kitchen and after a moment´s hesitation; the boy started walking in that direction while replying: "Tea would be lovely, thanks."

He would have never thought that death of such cold, calculating, uncaring and screwed up man could bring such sorrow as Victoria was exhibiting. But there was no acting in it, not even guilt. She was honestly sad his father was dead.

She must have noticed his inspection, and after turning the kettle on, she sat down and stated: "You know, Mycroft, it is much easier to read you if you know Sherlock. Otherwise you would have remained forever the enigma."

"And what do you read now?"

"Surprise. Wonder. Uncertainty, unless I am very much mistaken."

"You are rather good."

"I loved him, you know. You didn´t. Sherlock probably never noticed Siger was around, when he was around. I´m not blaming you," she waved her hand when Mycroft shifted uncomfortably. "He was a crap of a father. He was not loveable."

Mycroft couldn´t help but chuckle at the understatement. But then his curiosity got the better of him: "Why were you with him, then? I often wondered."

She seemed to measure him for a while, probably weighing the pros and cons of telling the truth to a fourteen-year old. "For the money, at first. When your mother was still alive. And because he was a bloody good shag."

Mycroft remembered the proceedings on the kitchen table six years ago. It seemed no one was a saint, not even Victoria.

"And then there was Sherlock. I found out I am a carrier of some stupid gene which is not dangerous to me but would be to a potential son. And even if I had a daughter, I would probably burden her with this decision, so I made up my mind never to have kids."

"You have Sherlock." He said without hesitation. It was true. What the phrase insinuated was also true: She was Sherlock´s ´mummy´, but not his.

"What are you to me, then?" she asked slowly, tears caught on her eyelashes, long hair untamed. And then Mycroft was caught. Perhaps it was his mistake – he made this woman to talk to him like a grown-up, after all, and he guessed that after the amount of alcohol she drunk on the short wake her brain was too confused to figure that he was her fourteen years old step-son.

As for his brain, he was pretty sure he was not drunk, at least before she put her hand on his thigh. And the other one into his hair. And then kissed him.

She was wet and salty and beautiful in her sorrow. And right then Mycroft threw away all semblance of propriety and tangled his fingers in her hair and kissed her – not hungrily, certainly with more control than he would have liked, but somehow he couldn´t bring himself to become the animal his father apparently was.

And, if her moans were anything to go for, she enjoyed it. Painfully slowly, he continued downwards from her lips to her jaw to her neck, trembling fingers working on a zip of her dress on the back, then finally opening it and letting it fall.

He stepped away to see. Yes, he was definitely interested now. She stood there, without shame, resembling some sort of a Greek statue. She used to have more curves, but now her body got something boyish in it, but frankly, Mycroft didn´t care.

The kettle clicked and momentarily distracted him, which allowed quick fingers to work on his tie and trousers, so sooner than later they were staring at each other, Mycroft in a shirt and nothing else, Victoria in her knickers.

"Lie," he said voice more sure than he would have thought himself capable. She did. Posed herself in the heap of black clothing like a queen, her face a mask of mild curiosity, her eyes predatory. Mycroft kneeled alongside her, and because he had really no idea what he was doing, he rationalised that the best way to go around this was to start with things he would quite like to be done to him.

His hands roamed over her torso and her breasts, mouth tasting hers (oh, she has more saliva in it now than a moment before), her ears (bitter, but she seems to like it much more than I would have thought). He nuzzled her earlobe for a while, since it brought her pleasure.

Ok, Mycroft, what now. It doesn´t look like she is going to reciprocate much, so you might as well be done with it. He tore her knickers in his frustration, which brought up a dark chuckle from her lips, and for a while he thought that she looks quite cruel.

Ok. Pubic hair. Black, wet and smelling – rather nice, he supposed. How does it taste like – there? He lowered his nose into her crotch, ready to start licking.

"Mycroft!" The shriek echoed through the whole Manor. Little steps padded through the hall, up the stairs and locked themselves in a room in the left wing before Mycroft managed to scramble to his feet.

Fuck, fuck, fuck! Mycroft was swearing inwardly rather unimaginatively. He knocked on the door of Sherlock´s room silently hoping no reply would be coming and he wouldn´t have to deal with this now.

"Sherlock?" Nothing. He tried once again.

"Are you clothed now?" came a suspicious voice from inside.

"I suppose," replied the elder Holmes. He had the shirt on and since he was putting his trousers in hurry, he checked the zip now. "No bits looking out, "he tried a joke unsuccessfully.

The door opened, but instead of Sherlock letting his brother in the little boy stood in the frame and measured Mycroft with a look which was both hurt and angry.

"You had sex with mummy," he stated. "You are disgusting."

"Sherlock..."

"Stop it! Finally, you succeeded. You are like him. With your belly and your ugly hair and you fucking mummy in the kitchen like he used to do!" It seemed Sherlock was more observant than Mycroft gave him credit for.

"You are disgusting," the younger Holmes repeated. "She was sad and you used her." A white bony finger found itself dug into Mycroft´s chest. "You said to me once that being blood-related doesn´t necessarily mean you are a relative of someone. Well, Mycroft, you are not my brother." And with that, the door closed.

There was no point trying to reason with him now. Mycroft went down the stairs to find Victoria lying on his dirty and wrinkled tuxedo, drunk and snoring. And just like that, Mycroft sunk to his knees and started to silently cry.

Because even though he was often accused of being and unfeeling bastard, he did care. And right now, he felt dirty. Oh God, he pleaded silently, why do I always have to fail him?


	3. Failure No. 3 part I of IV - No use to be angry

Seneca wrote that anger was, for the most part, caused by a surprise that things didn´t meet our expectations, and that we should never idealise people so that we are never angry they did not act as we would have wanted them.

Mycroft tried really hard to keep this philosophy close to his heart when he felt like tearing off Victoria´s head.

The funeral incident was never forgotten. Some two days afterwards Victoria came to Mycroft and claimed that she would need his help, because Sherlock refused to communicate not only with his brother but also with her. A family meeting was called and Mycroft supposed the rules would be to say everything any member of the household was burdened with. To clear the air. To return to normalcy.

What he did not expect in the least was what happened: Victoria accusing him of something which could be considered rape and siding with Sherlock in her disgust. If he pondered on Sherlock´s words about him being like father before, now he was certainly becoming Siger, the cause of all evil in the Holmes Manor. Except where his father was feared, Mycroft was a spotty fourteen-year old.

It was not like he was not guilty – he wished he could come back in time and kick himself in the crotch – but the punishment seemed to be too much in his eyes. If he were in the habit of calling matters lyrically, he would have said he was exiled from the Holmes´ hearts.

Four years later, Mycroft´s inheritance came through and he got himself a flat in London. There was no point in trying to appease Sherlock, when all his apologies and pleadings and trials to make things better were denied bluntly. Even before, he did not visit the Manor much, preferring to stay in the dormitory during holidays.

He wrote letters to Sherlock, hoping that if he were to rid his words of the curse of his physical appearance, he might get to his little brother. He liked to pretend nothing happened between them and wrote about his lectures and observing people to find out who they were, since those used to be Sherlock´s favourite subjects while they were still on speaking terms.

There was no reply coming. Eventually, Mycroft thought that all the letters ended up incinerated in the fireplace in the Holmes Manor, but he continued writing to his brother. It was nice to keep the illusion and it helped Mycroft sort his thoughts in his brain. He would have never talked to any psychologist, but this was to be his therapy – pouring his heart into letters which would never be read.

By the time he started university, he was approached by some shadowy figures whether he wouldn´t like to work for his country. Secret services always had a knack for using damaged individuals, Mycroft supposed. He agreed.

It was nice to think that even though he failed the one person he cared about, he could still do his bit for the common good. He wasn´t sure who would be the ´British public´ he was working for – he liked to visualise a family of four, parents and two smiling children, sitting round a dinner and chattering about anything important – but if this was the best he can do, so be it.

What also lured him into the Service was the easiness of his job – while he was still a lowly field operative, he was not responsible for the decisions – his superiors were. Was the man he was following a threat to the nation? Was the woman exchanging sexual favours for secret information? Was the guy he was protecting a friend, a foe or a temporarily asset? Did the man he killed really plan a terroristic attack? It did not matter. Because if there was a mistake, he was not the one responsible. His superiors were.

It did not take long, however, and he started to become well-known for his abilities. Mycroft Holmes, said the whispers. Capable fellow. Cold, intelligent, useful. Excellent planner, but with no problem to improvise when circumstances changed. And when he turned twenty one, he got himself an office, a liaison office between all the security forces, a PA and a nick name he hated: the Ice Man.

´Dear Sherlock´, he wrote, ´I wish things could have been different between us. Perhaps it is better that way, maybe you can become a worthy man easier without my influence. Because I am not a good man – never was – but perhaps there are no good men, just men who keep their darkness in check. I have found out that I can be of use, even – or especially – as my darkness sometimes lashes out of me. I have gotten a promotion today, in fact.

A week ago, hired men tried to kill me, and my security detail was hurt in the first blow and completely useless. I do not remember much, because at the moment the first guns fired, something cracked in me, and my darkness became loose. I killed four men, without hesitation, without even realising it at the moment, with my bare hands.

And then, just as I was starting to panic as the realisation dawned on me, I heard my bodyguard – William, I believe he is called – whimper and with the same hands I stopped him bleeding out from his wounds.

He has shown me a photograph later. I was not aware he had family – two twin boys.

What does that make me, then?´

He has sent this letter just as the others, out of habit. What are you hoping for, Mycroft? he asked himself. Even if he read it, surely it would not diminish his loathing of you; if anything, the things you wrote today would give him more ammunition.

Two weeks later, while Mycroft was enjoying the quiet of his flat after finally getting some free time once the changes in the way his office was run were finished, a doorbell chimed.

Mycroft did not have any security guards in his home – he had strong locks and good doors and windows, not speaking about the camera outside – but he refused having anyone armed in his inner sanctuary. The investigation on the shootings he was writing to Sherlock about proved that it was really a bad luck he was targeted – once this particular terrorist cell was dealt with, there was no one even suspecting what Mycroft did, so he refused additional security.

There was no point in being too trusting, though. Rising from his armchair, Mycroft took his government issued gun out of its hide-out and padded to the door.

What awaited him on the doorstep was the greatest surprise of all possibilities: for this long-limbed, curly-haired teenager could not be anyone else than Sherlock.

While dumbstruck Mycroft lowered his gun, the younger Holmes squeezed himself in and closed the door with an off-hand kick, which brought him spiralling to the floor. He was not alright – that much was obvious.

"Itwasnothardtofindyouforoneindangerofbeingshot," mumbled the teenager in one breath, before his head collapsed on the floorboards with the rest of his body.

"Sherlock? Sherlock!" Mycroft tried to wake him and when there was no reply coming, proceeded to put away the weapon and check Sherlock´s vitals. Breathing: yes. Pulse: elevated, but not dangerously so, for the time being. Eyes: open, staring, piercing.

Now devoid of the gun, he kneeled beside his brother, his chinos wetting themselves in something Mycroft hoped was saliva. "Ok," he said in his best friendly voice and cringed inwardly how unreal it sounded. "Come up, Sherlock. Let´s get you on the sofa."

Not getting any answer, and not really expecting it, the elder Holmes hauled the teenager up and when Sherlock´s limbs proved themselves as supporting as pieces of jelly, he carried him on his shoulder.

It wasn´t until Mycroft brought Sherlock to the light, that he noticed how ill-looking his younger brother was. Well, no fifteen year old has his skin completely ok, but even teenagers should not look like covered in rice-paper. Apart from that, Sherlock´s hair was uncombed, greasy and too long for Mycroft´s liking, his clothes were in dire need of washing and mending and the grey too big hoodie certainly belonged to someone else before it found itself draped over his brother´s bony frame.

But despite the circumstances, Mycroft couldn´t help a foolish hope flutter in his chest: His brother came to him on his own volition. It did not mean that everything was forgotten – far from it – but when Sherlock was in need, he came to him, he trusted him.

Whatever Sherlock took (and Mycroft wasn´t foolish enough to let himself deceive into believing this was not drugs – if anything, the long sleeves despite the warm May weather were conclusive and Mycroft was afraid to uncover his forearms), the elder Holmes realised that fluids were paramount, and after disposing of his brother on a sofa in a position he hoped would be comfortable, he moved to kitchen to get water.

Sherlock drunk so quickly and such large sips Mycroft was, for a while, scared he would drown himself. Apart from the outburst in the doorway, Sherlock still did not say anything, his eyes, though, although somewhat unnaturally wide, were alert and searching the room hungrily.

Mycroft knew Sherlock was reading him, his life, from the various items of the room. Only one armchair turned towards the fireplace – the inhabitant of this room is a loner, without a long-term relationship, and either not-caring about what people thought of him or not inviting then to his flat in the first place (in this case both). Books in cases – likes reading, but there´s some dust on most of them – time consuming work, then. The books outside on the table – on philosophy (Spinoza, Seneca, Heidegger) and architecture (Vitruvius, Kahn).

Oriental rug, but not antique. Wood and cream walls. Smell of citrus polish and paper and occasional cigar in the air. Conservative, then, at least in his tastes. A lonely picture, a print of Boullée´s Cenotaph for Newton. No family photos.

"I have a photo of you. Took few days after I started school," Sherlock mumbled. "Hmm..." "I heard you took some lectures on architecture. Didn´t believe it." Mycroft shifted Sherlock´s legs and sat down on the sofa.

"It is complex enough."

The silence after the statement wasn´t uncomfortable. It did not ring friendly, though, and Mycroft´s imagination supplied him with an image of two lonely dogs set in their ways and sniffing each other in a back alley.

Sherlock seemed to control his body better, though – it seemed the problem was caused only partly by drugs and mainly by exhaustion and dehydration. He sat up, took another sip of water, and when he noticed Mycroft´s painfully stiff posture designed not to startle him, he threw his head into his brother´s lap with an amused huff.

And then there was not Mycroft Holmes, the Ice Man, the Security Service minder and Sherlock Holmes, a junkie and an angry teenager – there sat the Holmes brothers, Sherlock wiping his nose into Mycroft´s shirt and Mycroft petting Sherlock´s head.

"She is a lying bitch," stated the teenager. "Who?" "Victoria, obviously. Always trying to control you, to make you meet her ends. You did right to run."

"Is she trying to ´control´ you to stop taking drugs? Because she would have every right to do so..." "Nah... Even before. Did not believe me. About Carl, I mean. Something was wrong, but I was ´shaming family name´."

Mycroft didn´t know who Carl was, but he heard the ironic brackets around ´shaming family name' quite clearly.

"Where is she now? How come you are wondering through London alone in this state?"

"Home, I guess. At first I thought she was gonna look for me, so I kept my head low, but bout two weeks ago I figured she wouldn´t. She is probably happier when I´m gone."


	4. Failure No. 3 part II of IV - Idiots and brothers

Mycroft stayed on the settee well after midnight, slowly stroking Sherlock´s hair and getting slightly better at it with time. When he was finally convinced that his brother indeed fell asleep at some point, he got up and after covering his brother with a blanket moved to the study.

"Yes, sir?" his assistant was still awake. He was thinking about replacing him, though – Ian wasn´t in the strictest sense incompetent, but displayed discomfort working overtime for the last two weeks. Both Ian and his new girlfriend would benefit from moving onto a less time-consuming spot, and the way the assistant handled this assignment would decide on how well paid the job would be.

"Is there anything pressing in the office for the next few days?" Mycroft asked, knowing very well that unless something happened in the last twenty minutes or so, he would already know. "No, sir. I thought you had a day off."

"How long could you run the office without me?"

After assuring that no, Mycroft could not be spared for more than a week, and yes, Mycroft would be available in case of World War Three, but on no other occasion was he to be disturbed, the elder Holmes was finally allowed to hang up.

Well, Ian, the better paid position it is. There would have to be a training period for the new assistant, of course, even if he transferred him from one of the departments under his control. Her, he thought after a while. Someone capable, yet attractive enough to be underestimated.

After dealing with this problem, there was another thing to take care of – and since there was no point in putting things off, Mycroft found in his brain the for a long time unused number of the Holmes Manor, and dialled.

Cheery voice from an answering machine informed him that no one was home. He did not believe it, but relief spread over his chest that he would not be forced to deal with Victoria in person.

"Sherlock is in my place," he announced, and after a second´s thought added: "Mycroft Holmes"

There. All parties involved were informed. No one disturb the Holmes brothers for the next seven days.

The next morning Mycroft woke up at about seven. He checked that Sherlock was still on the sofa and indeed was not a dream – not that he was usually subject to such vivid dreams, but one never knows – and that his younger brother was still breathing. Since he had nothing to do, he proceeded to the kitchen, trying to determine whether or not he would need some supplies.

It soon became obvious that indeed the state of his larder was in dire need of replenishing. As the inhabitant of this flat usually got his dinner as part of everyday negotiations or was forced by his assistant to visit a restaurant in the middle of the day, there was nothing there to prepare anything warm. Considering that Sherlock lived on the streets for at least the last three weeks, Mycroft wouldn´t like to feed him with take-away, so he started to compose his mental list of things he can cook and Sherlock could eat afterwards.

After finishing this task, his mental cart now full of pasta, chicken, cheese and vegetables, he continued to roam through the cupboards in search of anything suitable for breakfast.

Porridge. Bread, butter (simple, yet after applying a little heat becoming a supertoast). Eggs (good – would Sherlock prefer hard-boiled or scrambled?). Milk. Orange juice.

After putting the porridge back (he can´t feed Sherlock with things he himself hates), and about twenty minutes fumbling in the kitchen, he returned to the living room with a tray. Tea, a cup of milk, a glass of juice, toast and both hard-boiled and scrambled eggs proudly announced to the world that Mycroft was not completely useless at the stove.

Several gentle pokes made Sherlock stir and then jump into the air in confusion. Mycroft decided the best way to go about it was to ignore. "Good morning."

Sherlock replied with a mumble which sounded suspiciously like ´go away´, but once seeing Mycroft´s stupid grin and realising his brother was not going anywhere, the younger Holmes got up and stumbled in the general direction of bathroom.

"Always the mother hen," wiped Sherlock the smile off Mycroft´s face. "Royal breakfast and pretending nothing happened. Whole childhood in a nutshell."

"You consider seven years a whole childhood?" retorted Mycroft, voice perfectly even.

His younger brother did not deign necessary to answer and poked suspiciously the eggs. "Nah. Eggs..." Finishing this, he continued the inspection of the tray. "I am an almost adult mammal, Mycroft. I will not drink milk." "Do you want jam on your toast, then?" didn´t Mycroft give up hope to get at least something nourishing into his younger sibling.

"Not hungry. Why did you wake me up?" Well, at least he did drink the orange juice.

"I wanted to talk."

"We are talking."

"You should eat something."

"I already told you I am not hungry. I think you had better hearing when I last saw you."

"I called Victoria to tell her you are safe. She does not have this address, though, unless you told her."

"I didn´t find it out up until last week. Did she say something?"

"I left a message on the answering machine. She didn´t call back."

Sherlock snorted. Mycroft decided he might as well be done with the thing hanging in the air.

"What are you taking?"

"Can´t you deduce?" no fourteen-year-old should have such a smirk on his face while talking about drugs.

"Cocaine. Intravenously." It fitted what he was shown. And, were Mycroft to ever take anything, he guessed this would be his drug of choice as well. "How long?" And, after a minute´s thought, he added: "Do you have any with you now?"

"No. Decided to stop."

"And I am supposed to take your word on that?"

"You should be happy I turned up after what you did!"

Oh, Sherlock, if only you knew. Mycroft stood up and took the tray to put it back in the kitchen. There was really nothing he could say at that.

What did you think, you fool? That all your sins would be forgotten and he would live here with you and study university and become a doctor and live forever after?

A body draped itself on the doorframe and for a while watched Mycroft putting things into the fridge and preparing the dishes to the sink to be washed.

"I was angry," said Sherlock. "I was angry back then. Because I was wrong. I was certain you were gay. But more because you were wrong."

Mycroft schooled his expression, so that nothing could be seen, and turned to face his brother. "I was wrong because..?" "You saw but did not observe. Her, I mean. You thought she was a fucking saint, and you paid for it. And there are no good people, you wrote it yourself."

Before Mycroft could sort the feeling spreading in his chest at the knowledge that Sherlock read the letters the teenager continued: "And her darkness wasn´t even that well covered. Did you really think she was spending so much time with me, with us, out of a good heart?"

The sarcastic snort, that was forthcoming, suggested rather vividly what exactly Sherlock´s opinion on such sentimental bafoons was. "She was a leech. An emotional vampire, call it however you like. She enjoys when you are hurt, or confused, and uses it to manipulate you."

The curly haired boy was breathing rather heavily, as if the emotional speech he has just given was some kind of marathon – Mycroft supposed it almost was.

Then Sherlock´s gaze met his and a cruel grin spread over the teens face. His eyes, though, were amused. "And yes, I read the letters. Rather foolish, to make yourself vulnerable like this."

After chewing that for a few moments, Mycroft added:"You were not wrong, at least not completely. I guess I would be four or five on the Kinsey scale."

"Four or five?"

"That would require more testing subjects."

"Don´t tempt me. I know some places."

"That reminds me to let you be tested for HIV."

"I am not an idiot."

"If you say so. Some things may point to the contrary."

Mycroft has eventually shown Sherlock the flat, letting him touch everything except for things in his study. "This room is taboo. No entry, unless I tell you so or I am lying on the floor having heart attack." "Is it likely? When did you have you blood pressure measured last?" "Says the boy poisoning himself with cocaine. Shall I lock the door or are you able to follow my instructions?"

"There is nothing interesting there."

As soon as he was shown the guest room that was to be his temporary sanctuary, Sherlock hopped on the bed and messed all the sheets. He then proceeded to check the adjourning bathroom and after peeking into the cupboard stated: "There is only shampoo."

"Excuse me?" Eyes rolled, the door of the cupboard slammed. "There is no conditioner. For my hair." "It says here: Shampoo with conditioner." "Are you a chemist? Can you read this?" Suddenly, the green bottle was staring at Mycroft´s nose from about two inches. He took a step back to focus on the small letters. He deciphered AQUA and SODIUM something SULFATE, after which he gave up.

"All right, new shampoo and a conditioner for the prince. Anything else? Something for shaving, perhaps?" he added maliciously. Sherlock tried to look like he didn´t hear the jab. Point for Mycroft, thought the elder Holmes.

"Do you have some clothes? I would like to shower." "I´ll have a look." Neither did move. "Are you gonna wait so that you could watch?" asked Sherlock ironically. "I am going to wait until you dispose of all your clothes. I am also not an idiot. For one adamant on stopping doing drugs your pockets are suspiciously full."

"No cavity search?" "Is it necessary?" "You might enjoy it. After all you are known to put your hands on various family members." Calm down, find your peace. Breathe, Mycroft. "Not my younger brother. Are you going to have a shower or not?"

One by one, starting with the shabby jumper, the pieces of clothing missed Mycroft´s outstretched arms and ended up on the tiles. Naked Sherlock looked like he escaped out of Goya´s prints, except the artists creations looked far less surreal and far more right. His younger brother´s left forearm was dotted with small points. (There are no on the right arm. He did not learn to switch hands yet, that is good, isn´t it?)

Once devoid of any coverage, Sherlock gave Mycroft a half angry, half mocking demi pluie and disappeared behind the glass. As the water started to run, Mycroft collected the heap from the floor and took it with him to his bedroom. Careful search for something suitable for an fourteen-year-old failed miserably and he could imagine the turned up lip already.

Finally, after settling on a pair of slightly smaller chinos than the one´s he was wearing now and a simple white shirt, he supplied them along with pants and socks to the bathroom. The water was still on, a pale silhouette visible through the misted glass. (He probably never heard of African water crises.) He has put the folded clothes on the cupboard and returned to his room.

It shouldn´t have surprised him. Of course Sherlock would have something on him, you´ve seen the state he was in yesterday. But there was still something incredibly sad about finding hospital issued needles (Still in their original package, quite a lot of them. At least when Sherlock was doing a stupid thing, he was doing it in a clever way.) and sacks with white powder in his trouser pocket (Mycroft really hoped the coke was mixed with baking soda. Oh, please, let it not contain washing powder or anything worse. Wait, he´s using a solution – surely it has to be a little purer to disperse in water. Stop it, you are overthinking it. It does not matter now, either way he has to stop.)

How much could this be? Two, three grams? He pocketed the offending items, planning to dispose of them on the first occasion, and then divided the remaining things onto two piles: on the first one there was a pocket knife, a magnifying glass and a hairpin – well, Sherlock´s hair was long enough. Those were to be returned to their rightful owner – Mycroft had little idea what would Sherlock need them for, but as long as he didn´t use the knife to tear the upholstery, the magnifying glass to set fire to the books and the hairpin to pick the neighbour´s lock, he could keep hold of them.

Just as he was moving the soiled clothes to the basket in the hall, where he knew it would be collected and took care of by the half-deaf woman from the souterrain flat, who was responsible for all his washing and even transported his suits to dry cleaners, Sherlock stepped out of the bathroom with such an air about him, that Mycroft could have sworn that he did not step out of his meagre guest bathroom, but out of the river Jordan and was just a few minutes ago redeemed of all his sins.

"The clothes you gave me are horrible. I had to roll the sleeves and trouser legs and will certainly need a belt."

"Were you this picky even amongst your homeless friends?" asked Mycroft and opened a wardrobe to find a suitable belt. "I have no ´friends´, just acquaintances and I run from Victoria two months ago. I did not spend the whole time in the streets."

"Indeed? What forced you to change accommodation?"

"Human ignorance. May I take my things now?"

"Those?" Mycroft gestured on the bed. "Yes." Not the drugs, though, little brother.

"I will buy you something basic to wear while I´m shopping. Our larder is almost empty." At which point Mycroft´s home transformed into their home he had no idea and no time to linger. "What would you like for lunch? A sandwich, perhaps?"

"Too much work eating it."

"What else, then?"

"Pumpkin soup."

"Excuse me?"

"The orange creamy pumpkin soup, with croutons and fried bacon."

"It´s not the season for pumpkins, Sherlock."

"You have minions, don´t you?"

"I am not going to send my employees in search for pumpkins in the middle of May!"

"I will have nothing, than, thank you."

He did not change a bit since he was seven, Mycroft realised in horror. Except the drug use, of course.

Mycroft came back from shopping finding the lock locked as he left it and Sherlock in the same nonchalant position on the sofa reading Spinoza. His eyes flied over the pages and Mycroft felt a pang of pride – still a genius, then, despite the addiction.

He displayed the clothes he bought (two pairs of jeans, black and blue, two T-shirts, a white shirt, some pants and socks, dark-blue jumper and a new pair of trainers. Sherlock didn´t react.

"What is that?" asked Sherlock an hour later, changed into one of his new jeans leaning against the kitchen wall. "Pea soup. From peas," answered Mycroft, stirring the light green liquid to show little peas floating in it.

"It´s not the season for peas."

Mycroft had no idea in which month peas are deemed edible. "They were canned."

"Why didn´t you buy canned pumpkin flesh?"

"I didn´t look for it. I don´t think they had it."

"How can you know, if you didn´t look?"

Mycroft slammed the wooden spoon on the counter. "For God´s sake! Are you gonna eat it or not?!"

"Yes," Sherlock said and blinked slowly. Too slowly. He was not blinking as much as he should. And his irises were too large.

Now that he was thinking about it, even though there was vapour in the room, there certainly wasn´t enough of it to warrant Sherlock´s constant sniffing.

He felt blood rush from his face and suddenly he has grown so dizzy he had to sit on the chair at the small kitchen table.

"Mycroft?" Was it worry in his brother´s voice?

"Where was it?" he growled, not trusting himself enough to look into Sherlock´s eyes.

"What?"

"I am an idiot, am I not? Where was it, Sherlock? Did you hide it somewhere during the tour or did you really shove it up your arse?!"

"I have no idea what you´re talking about."

He was lying. Mycroft didn´t have to know, didn´t have to look up to hear that Sherlock was lying through his teeth.

"All right. All right, then," the elder Holmes sighed, his voice gravelly. "You have one hour."

"An... an hour?"

"Yes. To decide. If you want to stay here, you will get clean. Either with my help, or I can get you to a clinic, there are people who have far more experience than me. Otherwise you leave."

"You would let me go back in the streets?" Oh, Sherlock, is it unbelief in your voice?

"I would give you two hours. Then I am calling the social services. London at night is no place for lonely teens and I think it is time someone looked into Victoria´s ´care´ of you."

"You would have social workers hunt me!"

"It´s your choice. You are intelligent enough."

"It is no choice at all!"

"I don´t know, brother. Perhaps those you were living with would take you back and hide you from the Government."

"They wouldn´t! And it has nothing to do with drugs!"

"How am I supposed to know, eh? You didn´t tell me anything about yourself. Whereas you came here armed with perfect knowledge of my innermost thoughts and played me like a puppet!"

With that last phrase said out loud, Mycroft stood up and, slamming the door behind him, run from his flat burning with frustration.


	5. Failure No. 3 part III of IV - How to start a fire

Forty five minutes later Mycroft opened the same door to find his flat mostly dark. No light was on, even the curtains were drawn and only few rays of May afternoon sun peaked into the rooms.

Suddenly the small lamp in the living room flashed and a familiar voice called: "Do you know how to start a fire in the fireplace of yours?"

Still not fully believing Sherlock was really not gone yet, Mycroft walked into the living room to find Sherlock draped in one of the sheets from his bed, utterly drenched and certainly in no hurry to leave.

"The soup was good. There´s still some for you."

"Did something happen?" asked Mycroft taking in Sherlock´s shudders and the fact that he cleaned himself again after the shower some four hours ago.

"I was hot."

"You don´t seem very warm now."

"Which brings us to the previous topic: Are you able to start a fire?"

"I have central heating, you know," said Mycroft as he crouched in front of the lazily thrown in heap of wood and old newspaper.

"Boring."

It took some time until the flames merrily danced in the hearth. Mycroft sat himself in his armchair, watching Sherlock curl on the rug near the fire. After a quick glance at the clock, the elder brother stated: "Your hour is up. What´s your decision?"

"I am still here." Good enough reply, Mycroft thought.

"I am going to get myself the soup. Do you want a second helping?"

"Mmm. Yes. Warmth."

By the time Mycroft returned, Sherlock managed to put some clothes on. He was sitting Turkish-like on the rug staring into the flames.

"Thank you."

"I hope it´s warm enough."

"I didn´t mean the soup." Sherlock took the bowl and bore his eyes into Mycroft´s. "It´s in your bedroom, on the nightstand. All of it. You can search me, if you want. Search the house. Call sniffer dogs. There is no more."

"Th..."

"The name of the acquaintance I was living at is Victor Trevor. I knew him from school, he moved to London to live with his father two years ago. He was my boyfriend, but we didn´t do anything – anything like that." "You mean sex."

"Obviously. He complained about me being closed-off, so I proved to him that all people have secrets, especially those we think we know the most." "What did you do?" "I found out his father was a supplier of cocaine for most of the East London. Victor didn´t believe me."

Sherlock suddenly looked very scared. "His father threatened me, Mycroft. He told me he would kill me. And he could. All he has to do is to spike my – my dope..." His hands were shaking uncontrollably, the spoon clinging rather loudly on the side of the bowl.

Mycroft took it from his hands, putting it aside on the coffee table and draping his other arm over the shaking shoulders. He was pretty sure Sherlock cried, because there was no other explanation for the sudden wetness of his shirt or the stifled sounds coming from downstairs.

What have you gotten yourself into, little brother? One thing was sure – the Trevor bastard will suffer. _No one_ threatens Sherlock. As for the little Victor – well, he might be spared.

"I called the police anonymously to tell them about him. Arthur Trevor, I mean. But it will take time until they have enough evidence." Sherlock was still sniffing and his eyes were red, but he calmed down somewhat.

"Are you giving up the drugs because you fear him? Either that he would poison your dope or that he would find you once you refuse my terms and end up outside again?" That would be bad. Because as soon as the danger was off, there would be nothing to stop Sherlock from starting again.

"You feel great, you know, when you take it. You could do anything. All you have to do is move a finger." Oh, Sherlock, you _could_ do anything. The entire world could be yours, _if you give up the drugs_.

"But you don´t do it. You feel like you could solve anything but you can´t focus enough to _actually_ do it." Sherlock wriggled closer to Mycroft´s torso. "Everything is dull, though. Without it, everything is boring. There´s only so many things to be learned and so many books to be read and in the end, it´s all completely _useless_. If I died tomorrow, no one would care."

I would, Sherlock. Please. There has to be something you could enjoy. Mycroft didn´t say that out loud, though. Instead he claimed: "It was very foolish of you, to make yourself vulnerable like this before me."

A dark chuckle proved that the irony wasn´t lost.

"Perhaps you should try rehab. There are ones for very young people, you know."

"Their reasons and my reasons are completely different, and you know it, Mycroft. I would stick out as a sore thumb."

"You think you can stop all by yourself?"

"Cocaine withdrawal is almost without physical symptoms."

"I think the key words there are ´almost' and ´physical´, brother."

"I cannot stop all by myself, you are right."

Mycroft startled out of surprise. What was that supposed to mean?

"I can stop if you help, though."

The rest of the day was pleasantly uneventful. Aside for poor body temperature management Sherlock didn´t show any dangerous physical symptoms of withdrawal, and even this one wasn´t critical, which, in Mycroft´s opinion, was a blessing. His brother stalked through the flat putting clothes on and off in irregular intervals, opening every book in Mycroft´s extensive library and tossing it away after few chapters.

He needs something to focus, Mycroft realised. "It´s time to prepare dinner. Will you help?" "Can´t we go out?" It doesn´t have anything to do with my cooking skills, Mycroft thought. He is bored. There is no need to make this flat a prison for him.

After a few calls Mycroft booked a table for two in a restaurant he would never attend on his own. It was offering posh Indian food – the meals weren´t the thing which made him decide on this particular establishment, though.

It was in a very busy spot in the centre of London, with big glass windows providing view of the constant stream of passersby, and it was visited by various groups of people – co-workers from the City, crazy vegetarian artists, posh mothers along with their children and now and then an occasional government worker.

Let's see, brother dear, if I prepared you a proper feast.

It turned out he did. Sherlock spent the whole time muttering deductions about the waiters, the origin of the food they were provided with, the-man-with-a-second-wife-in-Cardiff sitting to the left amongst his oblivious banker friends and the-stupid-cow-that-thinks-she-can-loose-weight-if-she-doesn´t-eat-milk-products two tables away. He didn´t even notice that Mycroft managed to feed him a whole portion of _khadi_ along with two pieces of _naam_ from his meal – it looks like the trick to get some nourishment into the teenager was to distract him and stuff his mouth every time he stops talking to breathe.

"You do realise that it is a little off to call your skills ´science of deduction´ when you use both deductive _and_ inductive reasoning as a part of the process?" Asked Mycroft when they came home and Sherlock went right to his bedroom.

"Goodnight, brother," was the answer he got.

Mycroft checked if the door was locked properly and if the few embers left in the fireplace really died out, and ignoring the light telling him there was a message on the answering machine, he went to bed as well. It was his home phone, after all. Both Ian in the case of emergency and Victoria curious about Sherlock´s whereabouts would call the number to the study.

The next day at about six thirty Mycroft was woken up by a ringing phone, and this time it was really the one in the study. Grunting he stumbled through the hall only to find out that a ´situation happened´, and although the solution of the problem would take him only about two hours, he has to go to the office to do that.

After Sherlock reassured him that yes, he would be ok if he disappeared for a few hours, there´s no need to watch over him, thank you, he understands he is an adult and has a job now, and Ithinkwesettledthemegettingc leanissue, although most of it was said in a tone screaming ´go away' for at least seven miles, Mycroft changed and, having left spare keys on a hook in the hall, left for work.

Are you sure it was a good idea to give him the keys? What if he goes off to get his dope? Nah, Mycroft. You _have to_ show him trust now. If he wants to continue taking it, there´s no way you could stop him, anyway. Well, apart for really locking him up in some secret government facility.

But a small situation turned into a slightly bigger issue by the time he got to the office, and several smaller matters made themselves known by the time the first thing was dealt with, so at twelve Mycroft was phoning to his flat to tell Sherlock to not expect him for lunch.

"Mycroft Holmes´ residence."

"Seriously, Sherlock?"

"Mycroft! You said you would be a few hours and you spent the whole morning out. Is there anything big wrong?"

"No, more or less tedious bureaucracy..."

"Why aren´t you here, then? I am bored!"

"Find yourself a book."

"I´ve read all the interesting ones. I would go out, but it´s not safe. I think I am going to cook."

"You know how to cook?"

"Even less than you. But it's applied chemistry, isn´t it? I can certainly try. When are you getting home?"

"I don´t know. About ten in the evening, I´m afraid."

"Never mind. I´ll make something just for me. I will not burn the kitchen in the process, I am not on drugs, and I think the cooking could prove distracting enough for a few hours. You don´t have a target anywhere here, do you?"

"What for, dare I ask?"

"Well, you certainly know how to handle a gun. I thought it might be useful to learn it as well."

"Sherlock, listen _very carefully_. If you touch that sidearm, I am going to incarcerate you in the cellar of a secret governmental facility in Dartmoor and not having anything to _read_ will be the last of your problems. Have I made myself clear?"

"There is a secret base in Dartmoor?"

"Sherlock Edwin-Scott Holmes, I think this is enough."

"All right. No target practice. But I am bored and the food won´t take more than few hours."

"Try the TV."

"Mycroft..."

"Do you still play violin? I can have one sent to the flat." Mycroft, you fool, of course he doesn´t play the violin, it reminds him of Victoria and you heard how he was talking about her.

Silence. A thoughtful huff of air. "I think I would like that." Forty minutes later Mycroft obtained a memo that the violin was delivered and the gun retrieved from its hide-out.

At eight o´clock Mycroft found himself in Camden Town having taken care of his business there (oh my God, don´t my employees have a head of their own? Am I really the only one who could manage both the legwork _and_ the thinking?), the need for which occurred just after lunch.

He told Sherlock he would be home at ten – he could get to his flat earlier, but despite usually preferring to be on his own, he really craved some human company now _and_ a drink. Or more drinks.

So this was how he found himself draped over the bar in one of less well-known clubs, enjoying the soft tones of modern jazz coming from the next room, where a stage hosted some young band he didn´t care to remember the name of.

"Not trying to get lucky?" asked suddenly someone on his left. Mycroft acquired his glass and slowly turned to find himself face-to-face with a more than slightly drunk guy in a leather jacket. The man was gesturing wildly to the crowd on the dancing floor, where people moved to the music using various steps from twist to simple swaying to the changing rhythm. Some of them were draped over each other, and Mycroft could see what he meant – some pairs, both hetero- and homosexual, were getting _very friendly_ to each other.

"I don´t think we know each other."

"We do now. I am Greg."

"Pleasure to meet you." Mycroft wasn´t in the habit of talking to strangers, but this particular one had all the things he didn´t up until a second ago know he needed. Greg was dark haired, muscular, had chocolate eyes and was, most of all, horny. "You can call me Myc."

"Like real Mike, or short for Michael?"

"Neither."

"I knew you were a posh bastard. I got here only by chance, you know. They didn´t let me to the pub on the corner, cos t´was full. Even the badge didn´t help. I hope I didn´t lose it." Greg started to fumble through his pockets. A policeman, then.

But Greg was getting rather carried away from the main course of this evening. For Mycroft, anyway. Time to do something about that.

"Let me help you," Mycroft leaned into Greg´s personal space and stuffed his nimble fingers into the pockets of Greg´s quite tight jeans. Yes, definitely worth it.

"F...found it," stuttered the policeman and took a step back. Mycroft didn´t follow. His actions up to this point were bold enough. He was not going to force anyone. He finished his drink in one large gulp and turned his back to Greg to get another. If he was leaning on the counter rather more than was strictly necessary, well, the rules of the game never followed the Geneva conventions.

"See? I found it," Greg sat on a stool rather heavily. The badge he was looking for laid on the table now. Mycroft did not deign any answer necessary.

"I´m not from here. Came to see my girlfriend´s parents." Girlfriend? Oh, you poor sod.

Something must have shown in his face, because Greg smirked: "´S not like that. I am not... choosy. Ya don´t have to have a label, ya ´know." Greg´s speech was getting worse with every other sip.

"Shee... wanna get married and stuff. ´M not sure ´bout that."

"Do you love her?"

"Yeah."

"Marry her, then."

"She sleeps with everyone. Like – everyone. Not sure she would not... whatsthat... cheat on mee..."

"Don´t marry her, then."

Greg huffed and then continued to laugh for about a minute.

"Are ya always so sure?" "No." "You look like ya don´t chew about stuff a lot." "I have quick thinking." Another laugh.

"Right. Toilets, come." That took Mycroft by surprise.

"Do you sleep with everyone too?"

"No, just nice looking posh bastards. Back alley, then? You didn´t look the sort."

"I have a car near-by." It was the truth. He has even sent the driver home, as he didn´t know how long he would take and he could always use the Tube.

Greg took his hand and, disposing a few notes on the counter, he started to go out of the club. Mycroft followed wordlessly.

It wasn´t hard to direct the cop through the deserted lanes to the curb the sedan was waiting. Greg didn´t waver a bit – he probably decided to shag his last bloke before wedding, or revenge all the times he was the faithful one and his prospect wife the cheater – and why should Mycroft care?

By the time he managed to open the car door, Greg was already tearing off his shirt´s buttons, and Mycroft barely saved his fingers from getting broken all at once as Greg used his leg to close the passenger space from the world.

"Are you clean?" asked the copper matter-of-factly before continuing to nuzzle Mycroft´s ear. Mycroft thought it was unexpectedly damp, but quite nice. "Asks the man whose soon-to-be wife slept with half or the borough," retorted the elder Holmes. He earned himself a glare.

"Yes. I hope you are too. There are condoms in the car, still," and he motioned to get them.

In the end, the copper somehow managed to win the fight over dominance and had Mycroft pinned kneeling on the seats, head held on its place by a painful grip of light brown hair. Just as Mycroft was about to sound his protests, finding the view into the boot unsatisfactory and feeling a bit exposed as his naked arse stuck up into the air, Gregory´s condom-wrapped cock went all the way in.

He certainly didn´t expect _that_ to be that _good_. But it was – the pain, quickly changed into the pleasure of being taken, pounded into, even _used_ , the freedom of losing himself in his physical needs, of the steady rhythm, of being empty but getting filled, all of that was simply _wonderful_.

Mycroft has had experience, of course – he loved getting to know them, every piece of their body, and he loved caressing and taking care. He loved when they wiggled and laughed as he tickled them and kissed them. But somehow, it wasn´t appropriate now.

He was getting shagged in a car in a dark alley, without a string attached, without considerations. And the pain, the bluntness of the evening, felt _right_. It was exactly what he needed. What he _deserved_.

"You had sex," was the first thing Sherlock stated upon his return to the flat. "Does my sex life bother you?" Mycroft moved to the bathroom.

"No. But you said you had _work_."

"I said I would come home at ten. It is nine fifty seven. Can I get a shower now?" He didn´t wait for the answer and locked himself in.

When he stepped outside clad in his pyjamas and a dressing gown, Mycroft found Sherlock on the sofa in the living room.

"You should go to sleep."

"I slept till ten this morning. Not tired."

"I was serious, Sherlock. Does it bother you I am not celibate?"

"I don´t understand your need to be humiliated by strangers in cars, but I guess it´s your business."

The tone suggested that Sherlock meant it.

"How was the violin?" "Good enough. I doubt you could get Stradivari´s at such short notice."

"I brought you something from the office." Mycroft motioned to the hall to bring the thick file he has put there. "These are old, cracked ciphers. I shouldn´t show them to you anyway, but I want to see if you are quicker than the people from the department. As long as you promise me to not tell the contents to anyone."

"Gimme."

"Tsk, tsk. First things first. Did you make some food for me as well?"

"There´s some in the fridge. Are you gonna show me the codes or what?"

"I am going to teach you how to start a fire before that. Your attempts yesterday were rather pathetic."

After showing Sherlock everything he needed to know, including several possible positions of the logs for different types of weather in case he ever started fire in the wild, Mycroft gave his brother the matches and watched with pleasure as the flame started to eat the wood.

Sherlock has thrown himself on the file directly after that and Mycroft went off to grab a bite of whatever was Sherlock´s creation.

"This can´t be right," stated the younger Holmes fifteen minutes later. "What?" Mycroft almost dozed off in the warmth emanating from the fire.

"Look at this." A paper was put over the file and in the midst of various letters and numbers four names were written in Sherlock´s messy handwriting: ALAN BURKE, ALISON GROOVE FITZGERALD, MADELEINE HART AND CHARLES GROOVE FITZGERALD.

"You figured out the four names. Good."

"That´s not it, though. They are no terrorists. This guy," he stuck a finger into Charles Groove-Fitzgerald´s name, "is a botanist, who has lived on one God forsaken place in Cornwall for whole his life. Now he is senile for at least the last ten years and he has never done anything to become a target either."

"You shouldn´t believe people that easily. Everybody has secrets, after all. You are right, though. Neither of these people are threats to national security. Or targets."

"Do they have anything in common?" "Well apart from Mr Groove-Fitzgerald´s wife he doesn´t know anyone else. The Burke fellow heard of ´the famous botanist´, as he has put it, but overall they didn´t remember ever meeting or contacting each other. As for Ms Hart, she is ten years old. There was one thing – they all bought tickets for the same flight to America."

"Which one? What type of the plane?" "A jumbo jet from Heathrow to Seattle. I have a plan here." He produced a picture of the aircraft with four rounded seats."

"Perhaps it is the location of explosives?" "Possible." Mycroft couldn´t help but smile now. Sherlock was completely lost in the problem. He hoped the other codes would prove similarly entertaining.

"No. Even though they are all seated in the middle where a bomb would make the most damage, why would they be listed in this order? Why not name the Groove-Fitzgerald's after one another, as they were sitting next to each other?"

"Good. Any other thoughts?"

"The seats! The seats, the rows! They have letters, don´t they? That would be H, E, A, D. Head." Sherlock broke the pencil in frustration. What is it, Mycroft? What does it mean?"

"Well, head means head. But it is also a signal to an agent – a mole inside the department we knew about, but whose identity we couldn´t find out. He was working in the deciphering office, let the other agents look for any possible connection between the passengers and used to humbug to collect sensitive material and disappear."

"Did he manage to run?"

"He was apprehended as he tried to board a flight to Prague. He would have continued his journey from there, no doubt."

Sherlock sat silent for a while. "Was it you who found out? About the second code, I mean?" "It took me longer than you."

Sherlock didn´t say anything for a while. Then, he stood up and sat on the arm of Mycroft´s armchair. "I want to be a policeman." Well, the elder Holmes certainly didn´t expect _that_. It looked like this night was to be full of surprises.

"I know it´s ridiculous..." "It is not, Sherlock. It is good." Oh, Sherlock.

Perhaps there was a chance for them both to find their way. To be of use. And Sherlock, oh Sherlock, you see them, don´t you? All those _little people_ , the smallest atoms of the nation. For Mycroft, the British public was an abstract, a statistic, a mix-up of all of their beliefs.

But for his brother, they were individuals, stories on their own worthy of preserving. Sherlock didn´t bother himself with concepts of crooked morality and common good and necessity – he would protect every single life he can and discover every single truth he can and bring it to light.

Could it be what he was waiting for? For his brother to become his moral compass? For his fourteen-year old junkie of a brother to come to his flat and be so much a _better man_ than Mycroft?

He fell asleep soon after; lulled by sleep with the thought that alone he was Mycroft Holmes, the Ice Man, the empty armour and Sherlock was a junkie, a troublemaker, a scared boy. But together they were invincible.


	6. Failure No. 3 part IV of IV - You´ll be left with ashes

The invincible duo, Mycroft snoring softly in the armchair and Sherlock fallen asleep on the rug, got themselves woken up rather abruptly at seven thirty the next day by a doorbell chiming.

Mycroft´s instincts kicked in before his brain started to function properly at the first sound of the doorbell, and as he stood up suddenly, he almost killed himself falling over Sherlock´s body. He managed to find his balance, though, by supporting himself with the sofa.

"Whatsthat?" mumbled Sherlock, no doubt raised by the unintended kick to his ribs.

"Doorbell. Get the papers to the study," ordered Mycroft, gesturing to the folder from last night.

The chiming stopped for a while only to be started again about three seconds later followed by insistent knocking. Mycroft thought it was rather rude, whoever it was.

Quick glance through the peephole provided him with an image of two men, one black and holding a badge so that he could see it. Policemen? Whatever for?

"Yes?" he opened the door to them.

"Mycroft Holmes? We did call you yesterday, but you didn´t answer. My name is Gregson and this is Lestrade," the black man motioned to none other than Mycroft´s companion from yesterday. He didn´t look particularly hangover. Mycroft wished he handled alcohol half as well.

"We understand your brother Sherlock is here?"

"What do you wish?"

"May we come in? We would prefer not to speak in the hall."

"All right, then," Mycroft made way and tried to not look too self-conscious over his inappropriate clothing. "Would you like some tea?"

Greg, or rather Lestrade, looked like he would have accepted, but the tall black fellow decided that they are ´fine, thanks´, and rather boldly sat down in the middle of Mycroft´s sofa. In Mycroft´s opinion, this guy should have better manners, but since he didn´t get to the point of his visit, Mycroft didn´t press it. There was enough time to get rid of him later.

"What is the purpose of this visit?" asked Mycroft once again and measured both policemen witha steady glare. Lestrade was pretending to not know him – it was quite possible he didn´t remember his face after yesterday´s consummation, after all, and Gregson looked like he would have loved to smash all the things in the room just to revenge all the centuries of unfair oppression of his people.

Sherlock made his way back and sat next to his brother on the armrest, so now both parties looked at each other from across the coffee table. "I understand you are both stepson´s of Victoria Anne Holmes, née Burke."

"Yes."

"When was the last time you saw her?"

"About four years ago. We haven´t had the best of relationships," answered Mycroft calmly. "Why do you ask?"

"And you?" focused Gregson on Sherlock.

"On the 25th of February."

"How do you know the exact date?"

"It was George Richard Minot´s death anniversary."

"Whose anniversary?"

"He was an American physician. The Nobel Prize winner. Research about anaemia and its cures."

Mycroft could see the old medical book in the Holmes Manor library and can´t help but smile at the memory.

"She is dead," Inspector Gregson´s voice snaps him out of his reverie.

He is sure his face didn´t betray any feeling, and just this once, it is not a good thing. What is worse is the indifference in _Sherlock´s_ face. Because something is definitely off with the death, otherwise the two policemen wouldn´t be here, and _Sherlock is the prime suspect_.

"Can we talk to each of you separately?" Lestrade finally says something. After assuring his brother that he will be ok, Sherlock went to his room, which left Mycroft in the living room alone with a numerical superiority of sniffing policemen.

"How did she die?"

"She was discovered the day before yesterday by a maid, who was on a holiday the three weeks previous. The body wasn´t in a good state."

"You didn´t answer my question."

"That would be because I am the one asking questions here, Mr Holmes. You said you didn´t keep in contact with your step-mother, but you called her on Friday."

"Yes, and as you could hear from the message, it was to inform her that Sherlock was staying here. I thought it the decent thing to do, since she was his legal guardian."

"You didn´t know your brother ran out of home three months ago?"

"Up until Friday, no. As I´ve said, I didn´t keep much contact with them."

"That is not true, Mr Holmes. The post employees told us young Mr Holmes received a letter from you at least twice a month. He even managed to have it forwarded _poste restante_ ," Gregson said the two words in an overly superior voice, "to one of the London post offices and picked up every single one of them."

"He never sent anything back."

"Am I to believe that Sherlock disappeared from his home three months ago, spent almost all this time in the streets and then showed himself at your doorstep? And you didn´t hesitate to accommodate someone you didn´t see for years and who ignored your letters and didn´t ask any questions?"

"That is the truth."

"Are you aware he is taking drugs?"

"He is clean now."

"For how long?"

"Two days. I am sorry, but is there any point in this line of questioning?"

"The cause of Victoria Holmes´ death was not determined yet, but according to the first examination she has most likely fainted, accidentally bitten her tongue and choked."

"Sad, but I still don´t see why you are here."

"She had cocaine traces in her mouth."

Bugger. Mycroft mentally braced himself for the final blow.

"So you see, Mr Holmes, why we would be here. Because a step-mother argues with her teenage son, who is known to abuse a drug and he runs out of his home. And a few months later, probably by the time he would realise she is still his legal guardian and could have the social services searching for him, said mother is found in her house dead because of poisoning by the same drug her son was taking. You see why the police might get a little bit suspicious?"

"Do you have any evidence to support your claims, officer? Or did you just come here to insult my brother? He is not your murderer, if there ever was any."

"Come now, Mr Holmes. We have even found traces of cocaine in your brother´s room in the house. You know, I am not even sure he didn´t spent the whole time he wasn´t home in this flat, all too aware that your spoiling of him will cease once she sends social workers here."

"For God´s sake! You have seen him! Do you really think that if he was trying to get rid of Victoria he would do it in such _a stupid_ _way_?!"

"Well, exactly! He thinks he has eaten all the wisdom of the world! I even heard of him, Mr Holmes. He was poking his little nose into an investigation of a drug dealers ring in the East London, and that was not the first case he´s been pestering us! Remember the Carl Powers accident? A boy drowned in the middle of a pool. Yet, according to about two dozens of your brother´s letters, he was, in fact, murdered!"

Gregson was now panting heavily and his eyes shone with something Mycroft was pretty sure could have been nothing else than pure hate.

"You are not behaving very professionally, Mr Gregson, I must say."

Greg Lestrade, who has been up until now completely silent, touched Gregson´s forearm and asked the fuming black man to be allowed to speak nonverbally. Apparently, permission was granted.

"Look, Mr Holmes, I don´t think you have anything to do with this. I even think you had every right to not keep in contact with Victoria Holmes. She probably wasn´t the most pleasant of women. And it is lovely, really, how you care about your brother, despite everything. But look at it from our position – it does look like an awful lot of coincidences, don´t you think?"

Lestrade bore sympathetic chocolate eyes into Mycroft´s. "So why don´t you just tell us the truth?"

"I did."

"Come on. I know no one wants to admit their younger brother could be a murderer..."

He is not. Sherlock is not a killer. Except that was not true. Because everybody could be a murderer, given the right incentive. Be it money, power, fear or ideals. Mycroft knew he could kill someone. He even did, once. And then again and again. What reason he had to believe that Sherlock was any different?

Mycroft even almost killed Sherlock. And he _loved_ Sherlock. It wasn´t such a far stretch to believe his brother wouldn´t be that different from him.

"You are wrong. He has nothing to do with her death. By the way, I think you would have hard time to prove she really had a dangerous dose of cocaine in her and that was the cause of her death. I do believe that the results of autopsy are usually inconclusive after so much time."

"Preparing the defence, are we?" mocked Gregson, but Lestrade shook his head sadly and then said: "We will have to talk to Sherlock."

"As he is a minor, I would be present, I assume?"

"That is the procedure, yes."

Mycroft stood up to fetch his brother, closely followed by Lestrade, who was presumably trying to ascertain he didn´t help his little brother to run. He stopped in the doorframe, though, giving Mycroft and Sherlock a short time to exchange a few words.

"You don´t have to tell me anything. I heard you quite well," whispered Sherlock.

"I do not think you should tell them anything. I do believe, in fact, that it would be prudent to call a lawyer."

"You don´t think I have anything to do with this?!"

How to tell your little brother, that yes, he could imagine a situation in which Sherlock would feel threatened or confused or angry enough to kill Victoria?

"It does not matter what I believe."

The look of confusion, and hurt, and disbelief will forever remain burnt into Mycroft´s heart. The next moment, Sherlock was at the window.

The little boney body has thrown itself over the windowsill with surprising grace. Before he could say anything, Sherlock jumped out.

Mycroft didn´t notice he was moving until he stood at the window staring at Sherlock´s body landing in the hedges about a metre and a half from the base of the building. By some miracle, Sherlock seemed relatively uninjured, judging by his ability to roll of the branches, stand up and run in an impressive speed.

The elder Holmes would have followed his brother. Mycroft would have jumped as well and pursued his brother wherever he was running to – but with a bitter taste he realised that Sherlock wasn´t running anywhere. He was running _away from Mycroft_.

In the end, it turned out that Sherlock was innocent. _Of course_ , Mycroft would have loved to add. Victoria got the cocaine hydrochloride from a friend of hers, a dentist who couldn´t resist her charm and her constant wailing about tooth pain. He also believed her to be ten years younger, not having any heart problems and _much, much cleverer_.

Mycroft wondered if he was too paranoid to think that this might have been a last attempt to destroy his and Sherlock´s lives by framing them into murder, one last _coup de grace_ , before she has gone to hell.

He had made sure Gregson left the force. As for Lestrade, he was allowed to stay, but his promotion was much slowed.

He has lost trace of his brother. Sherlock literally disappeared from the face of the Earth, and no manpower, no money Mycroft spent didn´t give him any information he so much wanted.

When he heard from an acquaintance four years later that there is an eighteen-years-old Brit helping the FBI find a serial killer, who married and killed four women already, he moved there as soon as possible with a feeble excuse of cooperating with the CIA, only to find the nest already empty.

But if this was to be his proof that Sherlock was indeed still alive, Mycroft would take it, for there was no better consolation. Especially as he found out the FBI-helping Brit had still problems with drug abuse.

In 2008, he received a postcard from Prague, saying: _Keep your beast away from me._ A month later Sherlock returned to England, only to overdose fifteen days later. If it wasn´t for CCTV, he wouldn´t be found on time.

A few careful negotiations later and Sherlock was put into a rehab and Lestrade made a DI. With the condition of cooperating with Sherlock Holmes, of course.

But Mycroft really hated looking into the mirror in the mornings, because he hated the man staring back at him. The single, cold, untrusting and poorly-looking man he has became.

He wondered how many more times he will fail Sherlock. He wished one of the assassination attempts on his person was successful.


	7. Stay away

Never in his life, even while living alone in London and writing letters to his then-believed disinterested brother, had had Mycroft felt this lost. Because his whole life, Mycroft Holmes was always one of those people seeing countless possibilities ahead of him, and there had always been at least one remotely hopeful.

Not now, though. All he could see was bad, or worse, or catastrophic. There was no way out.

Oh, Mycroft, you utter fool. How could you be so stupid despite all your intelligence? Because there was no forgiveness from Sherlock now, and you would be extremely lucky if you could at least live with yourself at the end of the day.

"What do you want, Mycroft? I´m in the middle of a case." Sherlock´s voice sounded exactly the way it did these days: annoyed, most of all. I suppose, Mycroft wondered, I should try to remember the cadence and the tone of my brother´s words – there might not be another opportunity to hear it again.

"We need to talk."

"Oh, not again. It was an experiment. I have enough lectures from John, thank you." At which point exactly Dr Watson became ´John´, Mycroft wasn´t sure.

"Sherlock. This is important. Please." He could hear the hitch on the other side of the line, and sooner than his brother could argue again, he added: "It´s Moriarty."

"I am listening."

"This is not a conversation to be had over phone, brother." How long was I allowed to use that name while talking to him again? Five, six months? It took years to patch things up after the last blunder. And there would be no other occasion to use it again.

After some more talking it was decided that Sherlock would get to Mycroft´s office at the Diogenes at six o´clock sharp. Alone. Mycroft was rather pleased John Watson would not be included.

Dr John Watson, the enigma. Sherlock´s companion. A friend, even. Perhaps it is all me, Mycroft thought. Maybe it is not true that everybody has darkness in them, maybe they are good and the shadow I can see is _my own_. Perhaps John Watson is what Sherlock needs, a good man, despite everything, every punch he ever received, literally or figuratively.

"I am here, Mycroft. What do you want?" Sherlock´s tone is sharp, now. Impatient, and just a little bit scared.

"I have made a mistake." There.

"By inviting me here? Mycroft, if you are going to tell me I travelled half of London only to be told nothing..."

For a lingering moment Mycroft wonders if he could back off of this, whether perhaps if he lets his cowardice win he might have few more months, weeks of being on speaking terms with his little brother. But since that would endanger Sherlock even more, Mycroft states: "I have made a mistake with Moriarty, Sherlock."

He knows his voice was unusually soft and quiet. Scared. He has let his fear get into his voice.

"What..?"

"Six months ago Moriarty almost killed you in that pool and was directly responsible for deaths of the people in the bombing. Then he caused the mayhem with Ms Adler, the photographs and the Bond Air. Surely you didn´t expect me to sit and do nothing?"

"I didn´t think you would find him."

"Except we did. After weeks of careful searching and tiring attempts, we managed to capture your elusive friend." Mycroft suffocated the sigh. There was no point in telling Sherlock about the all-nighters he had spent trying to decode messages and find needle in a haystack. There was certainly no pride now about the times he managed to barely escape a stray bullet during this hunt, especially as he knew now that he was _supposed to_ escape and _supposed to_ find his prize.

Sherlock was watching from under his brow, sitting across the table from his brother. Mycroft desperately craved a snifter, but didn´t get any. Sherlock deserved the story in its whole and as coherent as possible.

"I wanted to deal with him as soon as possible, but there was information he had and we needed – lives could have depended on this. So we interrogated him, tried everything. And I mean _everything_. But all he gave us was a hint of some mysterious computer code able to crack any security anywhere. I didn´t believe something like that was possible – but there were some who thought we should try to get some more out of him and then decide.

He knew this would happen." The sad part, Mycroft thought, was that Milverton didn´t even know what he did. Charles probably still considered himself Mycroft´s friend and had no idea just what he caused. What he made Mycroft do.

"He refused to tell us anything. Nothing could break him. Then he asked for me, claiming that he would cooperate with me. So I did come and talked to him."

"What did he want in exchange?"

Oh, you are clever, little brother. Catching quite fast.

"You," Mycroft whispered. "Your life story. Eventually, I started feeding him tidbits of your youth, receiving breadcrumbs about organised crime and planned terroristic acts on British soil. But nothing about the code."

"How much did you tell him, Mycroft?" There was no way Mycroft was going to tell it out loud, but he didn´t really have to. "Everything. You told him everything, didn´t you? All you knew. Do you have any idea what he could do with that? He is obsessed with this idea of his, that we are bound to each other, that we are the same, that he has to destroy me. ´I will burn the heart out of you´, that´s what he said. He doesn´t want to kill me, just not yet, but he can smear my name in dirt and he succeeds just as easily." Sherlock was now pacing frantically across the room, arms flailing dramatically to support his words.

Suddenly the younger Holmes turned: "I really do hope you still have him under lock and key."

Something was closing around Mycroft´s heart, but he had to finish what he had started. "He escaped two days ago. It seems he had help of someone inside. I have my best people on this, but he just disappeared into thin air."

Now it was Mycroft who couldn´t stay seated, not when presented with a sight of his brother´s eyes widening in fear. "Please, Sherlock, please, I am sorry. I... we can make it better, there´s still time. We know what he wants to do, we can stop him."

No response. "Sherlock, there´s a way. You... I know you are scared of John, and the woman- the owner of your flat, even Lestrade and the brunette from the morgue. We can change Moriarty´s plan. I can... we can find him another target than you."

"And who would that be? You?" Silence. Than Sherlock smirked evilly: "Oh, of course it would be you. A noble sacrifice, after all your screw-ups. Putting yourself into danger to save your little brother, whom you _love so much_." The sarcasm hurt.

"Fuck you. Screw you with your big picture and British public and everything. Fuck you with your stupidity. Do you ever look into the mirror in the mornings, Mycroft? Do you want me to tell you whom I see?"

No, please, no, Sherlock, I am not...

"I see our father, our fucking uncaring bastard of a father. When exactly did this happen, _brother dear_? When you fucked Victoria or when you accused me of murder or when? But all I see now is him," Sherlock was breathing shalowly and quickly like a scared rabbit.

He is right, of course. When Mycroft looks into a mirror, he sees Siger Holmes, up to the last hair and tie pattern and wrinkle. He sees the man who hurts Sherlock, again and again.

"Please, Sherlock... I would do anything... Anything you ask from me. Please. There´s still some time... We could beat him, me _and_ you, together." Mycroft wondered when was the last time he was pleading like that. He couldn´t remember.

"Sherlock," the curly-haired man didn´t move, though, "listen, just listen, please. Moriarty is cunning, he´s clever, yes. And he can beat us, he can destroy each of us individually. But together..."

"...together? When were we ever together, Mycroft?" There is nothing to be told to that. "Yes. Moriarty isn´t invincible. And I can´t do this alone."

Mycroft´s heart loops into his throat. Dear God, he is not lost... His brother is not lost. He will be allowed to make this better, whatever the cost. Because he can be forgiven.

"But if I have to trust someone, Mycroft, it will certainly not be you. You told me you would do anything I wished. Do it then. _Keep. Away. From. My. Life."_


	8. Failure No. 5 part I of II - Falling

This is how it must feel to be caught in maelstrom, Mycroft thought. Because no matter what he would do, no matter how many resources and time he sacrificed to the hunt for Moriarty, the man was as elusive as a shadow in a cave. He was there, but never close enough to be caught.

As for Sherlock, Mycroft decided that for once in his life he would do as he was told. He sometimes caught a glimpse of a slender figure on CCTV - and when still oblivious Dr Watson wasn´t looking, there was a heart-wrenching quality to Sherlock´s look -, but he didn´t try to contact him.

Maybe it was time to finally let this dreamworld of his rest in peace. Because somewhere deep down, Mycroft always knew that he was too screwed up to ever happy. It just didn´t happen to people like him.

And if the only thing he could do is to make sure the last thing that mattered to him in this world didn´t have to suffer his damnable presence, then he would do it.

He has tried to subtly warn his brother about what he suspected was at least a part of Moriarty´s plan by the means of John Watson - but it was done so covertly that maybe the message was not recieved, or at least Sherlock didn´t react noticeably. But were Mycroft to tell John the whole truth, he would have destroyed everything.

Because time was of essence, here. Because if there was ever hope that whatever plan Sherlock was designing would work, it was important to keep John in the dark for now, and to gain as much time possible to devise a strategem succesful in fooling Moriarty and all his people.

So Mycroft did nothing more, could do nothing more in fear that one badly thought-through move would tear Sherlock´s web apart.

So Mycroft took care of whatever stupid problem occured in the government, signed the papers on the dotted line as he was supposed to do and tried to save as many numbers in the general box of ´British public´as he could.

And when night has come and he was alone in his townhouse, he drank. A lot.

What did it matter that now he truly became an image of his father? There was no one in his house he could hurt while intoxicated, except for ghosts of memories. There was nobody he could hurt at all, except for himself, and Mycroft was of the opinion that were he to choke to death in his own vomit in the middle of a six-room house in Kensington, it would be a fitting end to his existence. Because he deserved it.

John´s visit in the Diogenes was a blow. Because Sherlock said ´I can´t do it alone´, and because the only person Mycroft believed to be Sherlock´s confidant in every possible scheme to get out of this mess was angry and confused and completely oblivious of any Sherlock´s plans.

He wished John would punch him. But he wasn´t worthy of even that. He was truly and utterly lost.

Only a few hours later he was called into the Saint-Bartholomew´s Hospital. To identify a body.

It would be selfish to wish Sherlock was dead, so that this whole thing would finally end. So that the knife twisting in Mycroft´s guts would stop and he could either forgive himself with time or finally scramble enough courage to put a bullet through his own brain - and Mycroft´s money would be on the latter.

But the body wasn´t Sherlock´s. And it hurt to know Sherlock disappeared to Europe in order to hunt down the rest of Moriarty´s men and rather than asking his help, he used false documents and God-knows-how obtained weapons, when Mycroft could have gotten him both far more easily.

Mycroft was just cut off Sherlock´s life, not knowing where he was, how he was doing, if he was still alive. He tried to discreetly monitor all unusual deaths of known Moriarty´s accomplices and hoped one day he won´t be given a picture of his brother´s _real_ body.

John Watson hated him. Two weeks after the jump, he appeared on Mycroft´s doorstep with a box. Mycroft knew that the army doctor became Sherlock´s only heir and the handwriting on the cover must have been his brother´s. It was probably one of Sherlock´s many unsuccesful attempts to keep his flat in a relative order.

As it turned out, the box was full of letters. His letters. And answers never posted, some more than five pages long, some mere notes alongside his own writing, all in Sherlock´s scribbles.

"I want to know what happened." John´s tone was demanding. He allowed himself to be taken iside and given a scotch and even waited patiently for Mycroft to read the first few letters. But then he pushed on.

"You loved him once. And he loved you, from the looks of it. I know I shouldn´t have read this, but I did and I want to know."

And Mycroft wanted to say ´I still love him´, but the words never left his mouth. Because did he, really? How could he know? Is the Sherlock out there somewhere the one he feels so strongly for, or was this all just a _fata morgana_? What if whole this time he loved a phantom who never existed, what if he has dreamed himself a brother Sherlock never could be and never should be?

What does he even know about his little brother? And that realisation that they, Sherlock and Mycroft, were for all intents and purposes _strangers_ , all their lives, it hurts.

"Leave. Please," he whispered to John and the doctor obliged, but the smile on his lips was not pleasant.

"You know, Mycroft, you write in one of those letters that there are no good people. That everyone has darkness in them, ready to attack. Did it ever occur to you that the darkness you saw was your own?"

And there were thousands thoughts swirling in Mycroft´s brain. He couldn´t stop it, because he saw the contempt in Dr Watson´s eyes and knew that this man, this short blond guy, was the world´s finest representation of a _good man_ he didn´t believe in. And that if he couldn´t be forgiven by Captain John Watson, there was no way he could ever be forgiven by Sherlock.

There were thousand feels he allowed to exist in his innermost core towards John Watson: awe, for starters, jealousy, anger, because he has made Sherlock vulnerable, affection, because he has taught Sherlock to be a better man in mere weeks and succeeded where Mycroft failed for years, confusion, but right now, on the top of this heap there was deep and serious sadness.

John Watson was the man Sherlock needed. And when Sherlock returns (if he returns), this man right here will be the first to punch him and then hug him, and Sherlock will endure it. And this army doctor will accept Sherlock´s apology, because he needed Sherlock as well.

But Mycroft needed Sherlock too. Hell, he even needed someone like John Hamish Watson, who has became a mockery of all Mycroft lacked in his life. A friend. Is that so much to ask from fate?

And right here, right now Mycroft wants to open up: for the first time in his life he feels the urge to dissect himself into a heap of memories and feelings and mess on the carpet for someone. He wants to let go, to crack the armour he has built around himself in all those years and let John do the rest with his can-opener of common sense.

But it is too late, it is always too late. The damage was done, and Mycroft wonders whether it would have worked a year ago. Whether this man could have became the one to save both of the Holmes. He doesn´t say anything, because it would have been in vain and he doesn´t particulary want to experience John´s rage ripping throught his ill-developed affections.

So he lets John go away and reads the letters and finds out that he cannot even cry anymore.

Some hour later, he rings the bell on Lestrade´s unsatisfactory little flat in central London, not really having any plan, just hoping the DI would have enough decency to shoot him or at least beat him until he loses consciousness.

He does neither the one, nor the other.

"What do you want?" He makes way and Mycroft enters without thinking, closing the door behind and not knowing what to say.

Finally, he switches on the autopilot: "I wanted to thank you for services rendered."

The laugh is nasty. "God! You utter bastard! Why did you..? How is it you have the cool..? I failed. I failed, ok?" Lestrade had to sit on a chair, head in his hands.

"You did everything you could." It was the truth. Despite the fact that at first Lestrade had to be _persuaded_ to help Sherlock with a carefully put together dossier proving he was aware of his former partner Gregson´s corruptive acts, the now silver headed policeman has grown fond of his brother. Hell, he probably even considered Sherlock his _friend_.

"What do you want then?"

"I want you to fuck me." It was a proof of Mycroft´s mental state that he even allowed his mouth to say this. His relationship with Lestrade has been, up until this point and with the exception of the car occurence years ago, purely professional. But once he did say it out loud, and seeing the expression of utter disbelief dawn onto Lestrade, Mycroft continued desperately:

"I need you to hurt me, to humiliate me, to bugger me, here, right now. Please."

"And with what will you blackmail me this time to do as you please?"

"Nothing." Mycroft loathed himself right now, the man he was, the man who was _supposed to do this as a business transaction._

And then Lestrade´s hands are on him, showing his back against the wall and closing around his neck in anger and Mycroft doesn´t fight it, doesn´t lift a finger. The man who has been his accomplice in getting Sherlock clean is about to kill him and Mycroft doesn´t care for himslef, not anymore, but the man with his fingers round his windpipe used to be decent and it is just another proof of Mycroft´s darkness destroying all good around him.

A single tear left Mycroft´s eye and found its way down his cheek. The pressure is gone, Lestrade back to his senses and looking utterly horrified mere step away.

Brown eyes look at Mycroft´s slender hands. "Why didn´t you fight back?" The voice is shocked and small and vulnerable. Than a rough hand tries to wipe the tear away gently.

Mycroft stumbled back trying to avoid the gentle touch. No, no, I don´t deserve this, you were supposed to _hit me_. But he can´t talk, both from lack of oxygen, his body trying to recompensate with gasping breaths and because he just _can´t_.

"Can you hear me? God, Myc."

And that name from so long ago is what finishes him. Mycroft Holmes, the British Government, the failed brother of Sherlock Holmes curls himself on the floor and between sobs and breaths he hears gentle words whispered to him while he is cradled in someone´s arms.

The someone being Gregory Lestrade. The detective is vaguely aware that he is talking: ´It will be alright.´´Let go, just let go.´and things like that. He also hears Mycroft whisper: ´I have failed him, I always fail in the end.´, ´I am wrong, please, end it, just stop this, please.´and ´You have every right to hate me, why are you doing this?´

And frankly, there is no answer. But when the elder and now only Holmes finally falls asleep, Lestrade remembers a look Mycroft had around him all those years ago in the bar. And though Greg is fairly sure he was pissed as a lord at the time, he distinctly recollects a quality to Mycroft´s eyes which, in retrospection, couldn´t have been anything else than hope of happiness.

And the sad part was, Gregory Lestrade knew how the story ended. And he thought _his life_ was screwed.


	9. Failure No. 5 part II of II - Breathe

Mycroft woke up at six thirty, and after a milisecond of confusion the events of the day before punched him in the face. Someone must have moved his limp body at some point (and there´s a great deal of embarassment in the image of himself so drunk and tired that he wasn´t aware), and now he was lying on a couch in a tiny living room covered with a hideous orange blanket. And that someone must have been Lestrade.

After finding out that he was now too far awake to fall asleep again, what with the swirl of thoughts and regrets and memories in his brain, Mycroft remembered that he still, to some extent, has work to do. And that it might be a good idea to actually show up at the office today.

So he got up, folded the blanket as neatly as possible and put it on the coffee table. And because he can´t really function without a cup of tea in the morning, he proceeded to the kitchen and after a bit of fumbling, as silent as possible to not wake up Lestrade, he made himself one.

Sometime while looking for the precious leaves (and finding out there are only teabags), he realised that most of the space in the cupboards and larder is empty, even though it must have been occupied by some food quite recently. It looked like Lestrade was having some financial problems, with his salary at its minimum due to the pending internal investigation and the alimony he had to pay his ex-wife, not to mention the price of flats in the central London.

He thought for a while that he should leave some money for what he took - but it was far more likely to anger Lestrade. So he left for work and decided that he will look into Greg´s internal investigation. He should have done that a long time ago.

And he did. Mycroft Holmes, the British Government, returned to work and in one big sweep dealed with Lestrade´s internal investigation, John´s lack of accomodation (he had to be very subtle about that - Dr Watson must never know that the deal he got himself while looking for a new flat was Mycroft´s doing - or he wouldn´t have accepted) and his own employees who turned out to be on Moriarty´s payroll the whole time. Unfortunately, he couldn´t prove anything to Milverton. He would have felt great satisfaction in blowing the man´s head off. But he sacked him, at least.

He didn´t know why he was doing this. He wasn´t any less alone or wrong than immediately after Sherlock´s jump. But if there was any hope of forgiveness for Mycroft, it was travelling with his younger brother on his quest, and the only thing he could do is to help as much as he could to get Sherlock back in one piece.

He took a habit of a walk through Baker Street every other day. Sometimes he even visited Mrs Hudson, who didn´t say a word to him. He wasn´t sure what it meant.

There was a house across the street from 221 - it was badly damaged in the explosion some two years ago. No one resided there, and only rough scaffolding prevented loose bricks to fall on the heads of pedestrians below. There used to be one of Mycroft´s cameras peeking from one of the miraculously unshattered windows on the third floor. But since there was no one to spy on across the street, it was removed shortly after John moved out.

Mycroft liked the contrast of the lone window on the third floor - complete with everything, including a flowered curtain - and the wreck of what was once someone´s home.

He sometimes talked to Gregory Lestrade. When everything seemed too black, he visited the DI. Because he knew that there would be no questions asked. Because Mycroft knew that Gregory Lestrade saw a little bit of what is inside him, under the polished shoes and three-piece suit and clean shaved face - and the policeman wasn´t scared.

On the first anniversary of Sherlock´s ´death´, both men were sitting in Mycroft´s spacious house nursing their drinks. There wasn´t much to be said.

"I heard John has found himself a flat in central London at a miraculously low price some time ago," Lestrade tried.

"Hmm. Turn of luck, perhaps."

"You´re an idiot, Mycroft."

That surprised the elder Holmes. "What for?"

"I talk with John sometimes, you know. He told me what happened - what he did - the night you came to my flat. What was in that box," he gestured to the black box still sitting in the corner, as Mycroft didn´t have the heart to move it or throw it away.

"Do you want to read it? Do you also want a peek into my rotten soul? Is it why you are here? To get ammunition to manipulate me?" Mycroft´s voice was forcefully quiet.

"I already know what you are like, Mycroft. I don´t need to read anything."

"Do you let yourself be guided by your feelings while investigating in a similar way? Because I can see why you needed my brother´s help for then." But Mycroft couldn´t help but adds carefully: "Who do you see, then?"

Gregory Lestrade didn´t answer, and when he did talk again, it was a quiet statement: "It doesn´t matter what I see. Or John. But I sometimes wonder why you are so scared of everything _you_ see in the mirror."

There was nothing to be said to that. But after minutes of silence, Mycroft suddenly feels the urge to ask again something, get and oudside view on a question which was bothering him for too long now.

"What was Sherlock like?" The use of past tense hurt, considering he still didn´t have any news of Sherlock´s whereabouts.

"What?"

"If a stranger asked you to describe my brother, what would you say?"

Lestrade thoughtfully refilled his glass, carefully considering the question.

"That he was brilliant. One of the most intelligent people in the world. But he wasn´t reasonable about a lot of things, especially about his heart."

"How can one be reasonable about his _heart_?" Brown eyes met blue ones.

"It would have saved him. If he believed in his capability to love a little bit more."

"He would have taken John with him. If he had opened more, I mean. He would have destroyed the one thing he cared about."

"Perhaps."

Mycroft was right, of course. He knew he was.

The spring came, and then summer and autumn, and it was in September Mycroft recieved a text message:

_I am done. Coming back to Baker St. SH_

Mycroft could have cried with happiness. Moreso, when CCTV footage caught Dr John Watson on his way through the dark night to meet Sherlock at 221 B.

I could as well be done with this, Mycroft thought for himself. He decided to take a walk to Baker Street, giving his brother enough time to be punched. And hugged. And to give his former and hopefully future flatmate a full explanation.

But fate is, and always was, capricious.

One moment, Mycroft is standing in the middle of the night on Baker Street. The light emanating from 221B is warm, and friendly, and safe. Then, he could see vague silouettes through the curtain, making their way towards each other.

The minute he turns his sight deciding to come again at a more opportune moment, he notices something. The flowery curtain in the window next to No 221 was opened. And something metalic fleshed there for a fraction of a second.

And before Mycroft fully understands what is going on, he is throwing himself inside the ruin, opening the charred doors and running up the staircase.

There was a man at the base of it. He had a gun with a silencer on.

Grab the gun. Pull. A crack of a broken point finger. A muffled cry of someone kicked to the stomach. Avoid the blind punch. A hit with the now freed gun to the temple sends the guy to the ground.

Third floor. The window is on the third floor. Mycroft is flying through the wind, now armed with a nine millimeter.

There is a room full of people on the third floor. At least three muffled voices talking.

He should contact someone. Warn Sherlock. Call his assistant. But a glimpse inside shows a figure crouched next to a long range sniper rifle, ready to take a shot at the tall figure now clearly visible in the window across the street.

Before the hit could be done, though, Mycroft is barrelling into this man, sending the rifle flying to a corner of a room. The windowpane shatters.

There are five man in the room. And Mycroft is already on the floor.

Across the road, two figures are lying on the floor. "Sherlock, what is going on?"

"A window. The window in 211 was broken," it doesn´t take him long to sneak to the door, pulling a gun out of his coat. Gunfire could be heard. "Moran. He had to get away..."

All right. This is good, Mycroft thinks. I am still alive. This is right. Five bodies are lying on the dirty floorboards, their blood pooling quickly. Mycroft tries to get away from it, before he notices that he himself is half-sitting, half-lying in a pond of crimson.

It must be mine, he wonderes in surprise. But there´s no... PAIN

It hits him with a delay. Like a sound of a supersonic plane, he chuckles. Except it wasn´t funny, but it is better to laugh stupidly than to let this horrible, stupid ache overwhelm him.

He wonders briefly if Sherlock is still in his flat. There´s no way to tell now, all lights in 221 B were extinguished. But wherever he was, he was with John Watson and (or therefore, he was not going to ponder over this now) _safe_.

And the weird thing is, Mycroft is lying in a pool of his own blood, he notices that it flows not only from a wound in between his last few ribs, but also his mouth, he has trouble breathing, everything physically hurts and he is lying on a dirty floor in mere remnants of a house, but _Mycroft feels safe too_. He doesn´t even notice his eyes closing.

"Mycroft! Mycroft! Wake up!" There is one voice in this universe still worth listening to. And Mycroft´s eyes snap open.

"Sher...lock." Why is talking so hard? Why is everything so hard?

But his brother is there, his curls slightly shorter, but still falling over his face. He is holding my hand, Mycroft realises. He tries to move, but there´s another pair of hands holding him still. The other peron is also speaking, but he´s not important right now. His brother is.

Mycroft wants to tell it all. That he is sorry. That it was all his fault. That he wishes he could have been a better brother, a better person. That he loves Sherlock. But there is no air in his lungs.

"No! Mycroft! I forbid you, okay? I forbid you to close your eyes! Just don´t! Don´t go to sleep."

It is harder to get Sherlock´s words now than a moment ago. But the meaning is clear and Mycroft really tries to do as he was told, but he can´t.

The last thing there is is a pair of beautiful, grey eyes which used to be his mother´s, but now belonged to his younger sibling.

 _Goodbye, Sherlock... I failed you one last time_ , he thinks. And there is just darkness.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the end of the first part of a series. Second part will follow soon. Thanks for reading, comments would be greatly appreciated.


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